Changed
by I Brake For Bishounen Boys
Summary: Loki falls from the Bifrost and is taken in by the X-Men when he lands.
1. Chapter 1

_So, here's a weird idea that just grabbed me as I was immersing myself in my comics memorabilia._

_Disclaimer: Nothing Marvel is mine._

Changed

To fall beyond the Bifrost was to see one's self as though through the prism of a mult-faceted diamond. Few could withstand the never-ending visions that the plunge afforded, not without forfeit of their minds or their bodies.

Loki was not able to parse up from down, much less the many and alternate truths presented to him at once.

He fell for so long that he forgot what it was to stand.

He barely noticed when he landed, for he could still feel himself moving, albeit within the confines of Midgard's orbit. He was aware of the sensation of water, but only in the way that he had been aware of the infinite realities that had unfolded before him. Slowly, his hands clawed the sea, and he tried to climb the horizon.

* * *

It was one of the most ungodly storms to hit the town of Bodø. Though its residents were used to the windy weather that comes with being on the coast, none could account for the saplings uprooted and the boats overturned in their docks. And floating in the midst of the wreckage was a young man nobody had seen before. The fishermen manage to pull him out of the water, and find that his heart was still beating, even though he was freezing cold and totally still. The yellow ambulance reached the scene in record time.

One of the men who fished him out looked at his hands and found that the flesh on his palm was beginning to peel from what was unmistakably frostbite. He flexed his hand in shock, but when he blinked, the affliction was gone. He shook his head, and watched as the ambulance pulled away.

The unidentified young man remained well below normal body temperature, regardless of what the paramedics and, later, the nurses tried. Though his heart did beat, he needed a machine to keep him breathing, and he did not respond to outer stimulae of any kind. It was bizarre, but these were the days of mutants and iron men. It seemed only a matter of time before this kind of thing started showing up in the real world, not just the television sets.

But nobody was sure if they were equipped to handle a displaced mutant if and when he woke up. As it was, there were already complications. He had changed shape three times in the past weeks, transcending gender and colour with aplomb. Right now he was a deep shade of indigo, like Nightcrawler; this was his most stable form so far, as he hadn't changed in seven days now. They tentatively labeled this his default, and the head doctor set about trying to contact an agency that could deal with the patient properly.

On the twentieth day of his hospital confinement, the patient woke up, skin slipping into an unhealthy but quite humanoid pale as he did. It was not a peaceful awakening. Gagging on the gastric tube and panicking from the unfamiliar surroundings, he had to be sedated a couple of times before the nurses were able to make him more comfortable. Despite the sedatives, he remained awake and more alert during the ordeal than he should have been. His glassy green eyes stared in dull confusion as he was propped up in the hospital bed.

"Hello, sir... welcome back," Doctor Petersson said awkwardly. "Er... do you have a name?"

The patient didn't answer. He didn't seem to understand Norwegian. The languages that the entire medical team knew combined didn't seem to be familiar to him either. He murmured something in an unknown tongue that felt unspeakably old to everyone else in the room. Then he lay his head against the pillow, shutting his eyes for a sleep far lighter than the one that had possessed him for nearly three weeks.

Doctor Petersson at last managed to procure the number for an agency that apparently dealt with this sort of thing regularly, and was talking to an agent with an extremely calming influence over the phone.

"You say he's blue and has a hardy tolerance to low temperatures. Does he vary from a typical person in any other way?" asked Agent Coulson kindly. His Norwegian was very good, too good for him to actually be from Norway.

"He was blue, for a while. He looks completely normal now. But otherwise, he seems to be human."

"So your theory is he's a mutant," said Coulson flatly. "Has he been posing any threat to other patients or staff?"

"No."

"And he has no special needs?"

"He can't understand us."

"I'll send over the best linguist I know. But if he's not volatile and in need of treatment that non-super-power-specialized doctors can provide, I'd say that a hospital is probably the best place for him right now. Proceed as you would with any other patient. Be sure to call back if there are problems you can't take care of."

The logic was very commonsense, reassuring. Doctor Petersson could see he was right. Once the language barrier was broken, the patient would be far less difficult to take care of.

* * *

Doug Ramsey enjoyed travelling by train. Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment (in the original Russian) sat on his lap, neglected for the countryside in the window. He found it endlessly amusing that he'd been to Asgard and the land of the dead before ever visiting Norway. It was another startling reminder of his incredible good luck that he was here to do this.

He was greeted at the Bodø station by Doctor Petersson, who had a tall cup of coffee in each hand.

"Douglas Ramsey, I presume. I thought you might be needing this after the journey," he said pleasantly, holding out a cup. "A small compensation for the services you have offered us."

Doug gratefully took the cup, and sipped the scalding beverage before he spoke.

"I'm happy to help, Doctor. I haven't had the opportunity to apply my skills with such immediacy in a long time. And the audio of the patient that I received from Mr Coulson is really intriguing," he said. "Whatever dialect he speaks... well, I haven't heard anything like it."

_Not since** Asgard,** at least._

"I hope you can make something of it," Petersson said quietly. "It is quite the mystery."

"Don't worry, Doctor. I can understand it perfectly already," Doug said cheerily, and secretly cherished the look of shock on the good doctor's face. "Let's see our mystery patient, shall we? I want to know what alphabet he uses."

Crammed into Petersson's Smart car and balancing his coffee between his legs, Doug watched the landscape race by, and basked in the idea of a low-key and interesting adventure.


	2. Chapter 2

_Next chapter. There is plot._

_Disclaimer: Nothing Marvel is mine._

Chapter Two

Doug followed Doctor Petersson through the wings of the hospital, in relative silence. He didn't really enjoy hospitals; they muffled sound and speech in a blanket of weariness and stress. As they approached the room where the patient was being kept, Doug discerned the distinctive opening of _Doctor Who_. Doctor Petersson saw his look.

"He enjoys watching television, and a nurse has a box set of _Doctor Who_," Doctor Petersson said. "It keeps him calm."

"Whatever floats his boat," Doug said, and started to walk into the room. Almost immediately, he could see something was afoot.

The patient was half-sitting in the hospital bed, unfocused green eyes pointed vaguely at the television set. Jet black hair fell beyond protruding shoulder blades, bringing Doug's focus to...

"I thought the patient was male?" he muttered.

"Mostly he is," Doctor Petersson said. To his credit, he didn't seem at all disconcerted by the patient's sex change. "It's a side effect that comes with the medication. It looks like when he gets unfocused, his form goes in flux."

"...Okay," Doug nodded to himself. He'd seen weirder stateside.

"I'll let you alone with him. Holler if you need anything," Doctor Petersson said as he left the room.

Doug approached the bed, and the patient looked up quietly.

Doug cleared his throat awkwardly. A problem he sometimes had with his preternatural gift for languages was that it was difficult to switch from one to another without someone initiating conversation first. It wasn't impossible, of course, but switching gears like that was always difficult, especially with a language he hadn't tried out yet. And what was he supposed to say to this guy?

"Hi... my name is Doug. I am here to help you out," he finally said. The patient, whose attention had been distracted by the supernatural melodrama unfolding on the television, looked at Doug in slow shock. "I am a linguistic specialist. I work with cases like yours all the time."

_Minus the fact that **nobody on Earth** speaks your language, but that's beside the point._

"You seem surprised," he continued awkwardly.

"I thought I was going mad," the patient admitted softly, "that I'd lost all capacity for speech."

"Not quite. I would say it's pretty obvious that you're not from here, but you're definitely not mad," Doug said reassuringly. The patient smiled weakly, and turned off the television. "Do you have a name?"

"If I do I've forgotten it."

The patient seemed vaguely amused by this fact, and smiled apologetically at Doug.

"I ought to be more helpful, oughtn't I?" he said.

"Well, it's just a bit awkward not having a name to call you by," Doug admitted.

"Call me what you will," the patient said, and looked at Doug. "You said you were here to help. In what way?"

"Well, mainly I want to help you learn Norwegian, so your stay here is a bit easier. Normally, I have software that facilitates this process, but it hasn't got your language downloaded."

_Oddly enough._

"Thank you," the patient said, and Doug took out his dictionary with a grin.

* * *

Thor didn't often get visions. He was not as attuned to the realm of dreams as his brother or mother were. So when he did get an augur, he, arrogant Thor, knew better than to wave it away in a show of hubris; he paid reverence to the dreams he remembered.

So when he saw his brother sitting in darkness, lips stitched shut with thick cord, he grimly said, "I thought you dead."

"You are not wrong," Loki said. It was perfectly reasonable to be able to speak without moving one's lips here. "When I fell I shed vengeance and fear, and so in a way shed myself."

"But you are alive?"

"I speak to you. I am present here. In Midgard, my mind has been halved and quartered," Loki said. Indeed, his appearance was haggard and flickering. "I am in _Midgard_."

"Where? Are you safe?

"I know not where I am. My perception has... changed. But I am protected. Those around me don't wish to cause me harm."

"Brother..."

Loki stood up suddenly.

"I am in Midgard," he whispered. "I am in Midgard."

Thor awoke to the sound of cicadas. He turned over in his too-small bed, and said a prayer to whichever gods were listening. Few knew that they of Asgard were just as likely to pray as those who worshiped them.

After his prayer, Thor went on to find the kitchen. The Avengers mansion was well-stocked with every kind of fare, and often there was company to be found, for it could not be said that his team-fellows kept regular sleeping patterns.

Tonight Tony Stark was in the kitchen, watching a show on the television which was on mute. It was a news channel, though with the explosions and whatnot, Thor could have easily thought that he was watching one of the films that were so popular here.

"What think you of the X-Men?" he asked, startling Tony.

"For a big guy, you are obscenely good at sneaking up on me," he said blinking a couple of times at the god of thunder standing before him. "The X-Men are... interesting. I'm not sure what their angle is, but they seem to be doing good things. Are they what's keeping you up?"

"No. I had a vision of my brother. He came to me in a dream," Thor said quietly. "And it unsettled me."

"I thought your brother was dead," Tony said.

"As did I. It appears that he still lives, in some capacity."

"How do you know it wasn't just a dream?"

"The visions of the Aesir are never just dreams," Thor said bluntly. "If I spoke with my brother in the sleeping-realm, then he has been spared Hel."

"But wasn't the reason that you left Asgard for good...?"

"It matters little if he is alive. My father was still glad to see him dead," Thor snapped. _"He did not mourn_, stripping Loki of the honours due to him, as a son, a once-king, and a warrior of Asgard. Such an insult is beneath even the lowliest of parasites and worms. I shall continue to wield Mjolnir in Midgard until my father sheds a tear for the son he drove to madness."

"Speaking of which, if he is alive, is that a cause for concern?" Tony said, reeling a bit from the passionate speech. Thor could be described by many words, but eloquent wasn't one of them. "I mean, by your own admission he tried to obliterate an entire world already."

"He does not have the power that afforded him the opportunity before," Thor said shortly. "The Bifrost remains shattered, and my brother is not at the height of his ability."

"So where is he?"

"I know not," Thor said, and went to the pantry for his box of Pop Tarts. "He says he is safe, but he does not seem hale."

Tony asked a few more questions but Thor, deep in thought, would not answer. Exhausted, Tony went back to bed. He was never a fan of the Asgardian telenovelas that came with his alien teammate.


	3. Chapter 3

_Here's the next chapter. I really enjoyed working with one of the more obscure X-Men._

_Disclaimer: Nothing Marvel is mine._

Chapter Three

"He doesn't register on Cerebro," Charles said on the phone. "So he is either shielding himself telepathically or he isn't a mutant."

Douglas leaned against the wall, tugging at a curl by his ear in slight frustration.

"If he isn't a mutant, than what is he?" he reasoned. "I watched the guy change form without even really realizing. I was with him for thirty minutes with my dictionary before he started speaking Norwegian fluently. He's learning it off of the_ Doctor Who_ subtitles. He just needed a flimsy but implicit connection between written and spoken word. That's a rapid learning curve that I've only seen in myself, Professor. So what is he?"

"You know we are not alone in this universe," Charles said, "and you said yourself that you've only seen this kind of language in Asgard. Draw your own conclusions."

"You think he's Aesir?"

"At present, that seems the best explanation."

"What's he doing _here_?" Doug asked. It wasn't that he hadn't had the same suspicion that Xavier did, but it was a bit startling to think that a Norse god was sitting in the hospital room next door watching British sci-fi. "What am I supposed to do?"

"The same as you set out to do, Douglas. He is still someone in need of aid."

And the Professor hung up. Doug looked around hopelessly, and then went back into the patient's room. The television was off, and the patient was reading what appeared to be_ Harry Potter_. Doug grinned, and in Norwegian asked, "Good book, Matt?"

He smiled, and nodded. Matt had decided to dub himself so after the name of the actor who played the latest, and his favourite, incarnation of the Doctor. It suited him, in a way, and made addressing him much easier.

"The healer Alfeid gave it to me this morning," he said softly. His Norwegian was ridiculously fluent, but still carried over some of the odd declamatory syntax of whatever it was he originally spoke. "It is a book of wonders."

"That it is," Doug said with a little laugh. "I remember reading that when I was a kid."

_And going crazy because the spells aren't actually in any language_, he thought with a smile.

"Maybe I have read this before," Loki said.

_I don't know if they have Harry Potter translated into Asgardian._

"What do you remember of your life before, Matt?" Doug asked, wondering even as the words left his mouth if this was the best way to broach the subject. Matt put the book down, and shook his head.

"Very little," he said softly. "Sometimes, when I think hard, I can remember small things, words and colours. But they seem so faint to feel imagined. Half-forgotten dreams. Nothing feels real to me except for here. I wish I could remember if I had a family, or a home, but it seems to me that all my life I have been sleeping."

He shuddered slightly.

"I wish never to sleep again," he said, reverting to his original language, and then looked up. "Can you help me?"

"Matt, I'm just a linguist. I don't know how I could help," Doug admitted.

"Sometimes they talk about you," Matt said. His green eyes moved back and forth on Doug's face, as though he could read him. "They say that you're part of an organization for... people like me. People who don't belong."

"The X-Men," Doug said with a hint of resignation in his voice. "Matt, I can honestly say that the X-Men were both the best and worst things that happened to me. And maybe that's because it wasn't for me. Look, I was just a kid who was really good at languages. My talent, my... power was never really visible compared to the stuff that people think of mutants doing. Like my friend Kitty; she needed help controlling her powers, she had serious issues with floors and walls. She found it there. She didn't find a normal life. Few people who join the X-Men do."

"I don't even know what normal is," Matt said.

"Well, maybe you want to, before you think about the X-Men as a viable lifestyle choice. It's like high school, only with more superpowers and murder," Doug said. "It's not really a safe environment for someone who's recovering from trauma."

He saw Matt's look, and sighed.

"I know what it is to want to belong, Matt. You can have that here. We can arrange for you to have a life here, for you to go to college and learn the skills you need to contribute to society."

"And what then?"

"Then you can live the rest of your life without even the slightest fear of deciding the world's fate," Doug said. "It's a blessing. Trust me."

Matt nodded softly. Mostly, he seemed convinced, but Doug could see in his shoulders the kind of disappointment that needled and hungered.

* * *

Doug spent only a few more days with Matt before he deemed the guy proficient enough in written and spoken Norwegian for his age group. Matt was also good enough to commit a great deal of his native tongue to Doug's database. Doug was pretty much ecstatic; he'd needed a newer, more secure code for encryption for a while, and Matt's language would more than fit the bill.

With Professor Xavier's financial assistance, Doug had arranged for Matt to move out of the hospital, into a small bed and breakfast run by a lovely lesbian couple who were happy to spare the basement room for the amount of money being offered. Matt would also gain employment there, for bed and breakfast had needed an extra hand in the kitchen for some time now. This was a tentative start to the productive life Doug sincerely hoped Matt would get to lead.

They'd set him up with an occupational therapist, to help him compensate for the lifetime he'd lost in his accident.

Matt wasn't ready for Doug to go. It showed in his shoulders and eyes, but he said nothing.

"Here's a couple of numbers for you. That one's my direct line, and that one's to Agent Phil Coulson. If you feel threatened in any way, call Coulson. He'll know what to do," Doug said. "Unless, you know, there's a house fire or something. Then I'm pretty sure you can call emergency services."

"Thank you for your help," Matt said softly.

"No problem. It should be me thanking you. Your language is a true gift," Doug reassured. "Keep in touch, okay? If you need someone to talk to, I'll always be available."

Matt nodded.

"Douglas?"

"Yeah."

"You had a code name, when you were with the X-Men. You had to. What was it?"

Matt's slight obsession with the X-Men had only grown with his newfound access to the Internet. Doug didn't like to humour him too much with old war stories, but he was comfortable with answering harmless questions like these.

"It wasn't a code name so much as a nickname. I wasn't in action enough to really need something like that. But they called me Cypher."

"Cypher."

They talked for a little longer, and then Doug left to catch his train to the airport.


End file.
